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Hello all + Crumb Holes

Hello all + Crumb Holes

Hello from Yakima, Washington,

Thanks for having me on this site. I am an amateur baker, newly in love with baking breads. I discovered TheFreshLoaf a few months ago, searching for Potato bread, and found Floyd's Baked potato bread, which turned out delicious. Then I was quite taken by the NYT No-knead bread discussions! And today I saw Jim's "French Folding" method. I loved it. And finally I decided to join the site and Signed in :) I am quite excited.

I like to bake mostly 100% Whole Wheats. I love all those pictures here of the breads with the Big Holes in the bread Crusts. I tried the NYT recipe with WW, but have failed to get any holes :(

What can I do to get these? My husband, though, says that he likes my breads without holes just fine as the butter etc. would just drip through the holes :P But I just want those holes.

I would like to know how to get the holes. I made bread yesterday following the directions in the "Bread Alone" book for the Beginners Country Loaf following it exactly.

I baked it on my baking stone in our outdoor BBQ. Has anyone ever had experience with this? It turned out perfectly, however the holes in the bread were very small, though I did get some. I used 1 whole wheat to 3 bread flour and 1 1/4 cups water.

Hi you guys, I'm glad you like the video and that it's inspiring so many. Thanks to Floyd for tweaking the permissions so you can view it from the site. He is a star.

There's a few things you need to do to get good sized holes.slacker dough. which might mean wetter or longer ferment, I can't give you the science but long fermentation with a dough makes it slacker, you don't have to use natural leaven either for this. Make up your dough without the yeast, let it rest over night then add your yeast or starter. Of course it's much easier if you use natural leaven and mix all together at once, then leave it over night. I almost never use yeast so none of my pix or yeasted breads. Shaping. Take care when shaping not to knock the air out or your dough.Shape in two stages with a 15 minute gap in between.Now I don't know for sure if this has helped or it's a coincidence but my bread structure is better since I started using the linen cloths shown in Floyd's pix.But the butter does fall through. lol. Jim

Thanks for the tips! I am just a beginner.. Don't know much about shaping! I will try the linen cloths definitely.

The reason for my holeless breads could be because I like to make 100% Whole Wheat breads? I read on this site that the bran cuts the gluten etc... Also somebody mentioned that one might want to add some gluten to the dough in a WW brerad?

It's really tough to get big holes with 100% whole wheat bread. The best I've been able to do is with a 50-50 white to whole wheat flour ciabatta. I did get some big holes when I tried a no-knead whole wheat bread with a ridiculously high hydration -- 93%. But it failed to rise very much, and I essentially had a thick pancake.

I'd imagine you could make a 100% whole wheat foccacia that would have big holes, but it's only going to be a couple of inches high.

I agree, though, that wetter is much better. For white breads, water is about 55% to 72% of the flour weight, though some recipes go as high as 80%. That's a really, really wet dough, and it's tough to handle.

With whole wheat, I start at 75%, with most of my breads today around 80% or higher.

Hi SrishtiIt is true that it's hard to get the large holes in 100% WW, but you can get good crumb nonetheless. You do have to bee gentle with, long rises help or soaking the flour over night. Then if you fold rather than knead it will help, as Andrew has said. You don't want to go adding stuff if you don't have to. I get nervous about refining this and extracting that. If I wanted additives I'd go to the supermarket. But having large holes really is not such a big deal as long as it's light, and you can very light 100% ww bread if you do as I suggested. Not one of my best but it's the only one I have in my photobucket at the moment. I don't make many whole wheat breads though. So If I can do this anyone can. : -)Jim

Very nice looking bread. Forgive me if I've missed this elsewhere, but would you mind sharing the forumula you used for this? Specifically, I'm wondering what the hydration was -- I'm guessing somewhere in the neighborhood of 80-85%?

I use 50% whole wheat and 50% white bread flour, about 75% hydration. Minimal knead - really just the folding (like paper into 3 to go in an envelope) at the end of the first half hour, second half hour, second hour and third hour. Trying not to degas at all, then gently fold and shape when it has benn proving about 8 hours. With the minimal kneading / handling, you can get excellent big holes in the crumb. The starter, which lives in the fridge as a stiff starter until I use it to make a dough, when it is converted to 100% hydration, also developes big holes!It can be done...Andrew

Thanks you all people, I'll give it another shot soon. I am going to start a sourdough starter today (sourdoLady's OJ starter). And in a week or 2 give it another shot.

Though I have to admit, that all I can think these days is bread. I have read so much contents on this website that it's all crumpled up inside my head. Haven't had time to organize it all (in my head) by actually doing some real baking :P (Just been baking in my imaginations) ha ha.

I see that you've already gotten alot of advice from everyone else, but is it okay if I pitch in? LOL Well, I was having the same problem just about 2 months ago when working with doughs with a high percentage of whole wheat flour. I asked a baker friend why I was getting such dense crumb and he told me that over kneading or mixing whole wheat flour will cause the hull of the wheat to tear the gluten strands, making them much smaller and not have the abilty to support the weight of the dough rising. Good luck!

Well, yesterday I made baugettes from BBA (ALL WHITE :P ). I made the pete fermente the day before... Took it out of the fridge about 9 in the morning. Had it sit around till 11 to get warmed up. Made the final dough. Ony Kneaded it until I could do the windowpane test. Then it sat around until doubled which was 3pm. Then I shaped them and let sit until 5 and baked them.

And as promised in the book, to me it didn't taste much better and plainold Wonder Bread.... (Not that I have ever tasted Wonder Bread....) But it didn't have that special taste of Baugettes. Probably because of the absense of Holes the proteins didn't get roasted enough? Decent crust.

Also after baking the loaves kinda got opened a bit at the seams....

Anyway, I think, I will stick to the good whole grains :)

No news form OJ (That's my baby starter, I named him OJ) , He's on his 6th day.... no bubbles at all. It's really sour smelling. The recipe is SourDoLady's. But no bubbles. Maybe I'll add 1/4 tsp of Applecider vinegar to it? It's alll whole wheat + OJ for the first 3 days.

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